Quite early one morning, towards the end of the month Thakkol, Eud-Ecachlon's servant appeared at the gate with a letter for Occula. This was brought to her personally in the women's quarters, since Terebinthia was not yet up and would have bitten the head off any household slave who had ventured to disturb her. Occula, however, uncertain of the Urtan handwriting, made no bones about waking Dyphna to read it. Eud-Ecachlon wrote that owing to the illness of his father, the old High Baron, he had been called back to Urtah urgently, would be leaving Bekla next morning and earnestly begged Occula to spend a last afternoon or evening with him.
"That one-balled Urtan goat!" said Occula, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes and pulling up her night-shift to scratch her ribs. "Thanks, Dyphna. He can't even do it- he jus' enjoys tryin'."
"I expect you can get him up to it, can't you?" asked Maia.
"Cran and Airtha, banzi!" answered the black girl. "You talk as if he'd been on and off me like a crow on a roof! Idoan' spend any more time with the Urtans than I've got to, you know. All the same," she continued, as they left Dyphna and strolled back to the pool room, where Ogma was waiting for the reply, "I'll have to go, little as I fancy it."
"Why, dearest?" asked Maia.
"Because," replied Occula, whispering, "Elvair-ka-Vir-rion told me at a party the other night that if we got the chance, one of us-you or me-must do all we could to spend more time with Eud-Ecachlon before he left Bekla and report anythin' he might say about Suba: that's why. Ogma, will you tell Lord Eud-Ecachlon's man that I'll have to speak to the saiyett as soon as she's up, but I'll probably be able to come this afternoon?"
An hour after mid-day, however, she slipped down from the garden room, where Sencho was dining-after a fashion-with the help of Terebinthia and herself, and interrupted Maia's dancing-practice.
"I'm not goin', banzi," she said. "Doan' ask me why; I'll tell you another time. I've told Pussy and she's agreed that you're to go instead."
"Me?" said Maia, astonished.
"Yes, you!" replied Occula impatiently. "Doan' look so damn' surprised, as if you didn' know a zard from a parsnip. Get your deldas pulled up and your dress on. And look sharp too-the jekzha's here."
The next moment Terebinthia appeared to corroborate Occula. "The High Counselor says he can't spare her this afternoon," she said. "He's still not himself, I'm afraid. Your powder-blue dress will do very well, and as it's an Urtan you'd better wear plenty of jewels-that always impresses them."
"Now listen, Maia," she added later.when she had given her her cloak and was walking with her to the courtyard, "Eud-Ecachlon's lodgings are in the lower city-somewhere near the Tower of the Orphans, I believe. You're
to go straight there and come straight back, and you're not to get out of the jekzha on any account, do you understand? A slave-girl of the High Counselor has a position to maintain, and if I hear that you've been racketing round any shops or bazaars by yourself there'll be serious trouble. If Eud-Ecachlon chooses to take you, of course, that's another matter. You shouldn't be away more than four hours at most-the High Counselor may want you at supper-time. I'm sure we all hope he will."
It so happened that, as sometimes occurred during Me-lekril, the rain had let up for a few hours. Maia set off in high spirits. This would be the first time she had been out of the upper city since Lalloc had sold her to Sencho. In her restricted life to go out at all was an excitement, but to be bound for the lower city-smoky, pungent, clamorous, spread out before her like a sunset sky full of rooks-was exhilaration itself. As soon as they were well outside Sencho's gate she began chaffing the jekzha-man, giving as good as she got all the way down the walled road to the Peacock Gate. Going through the Moon Room by herself-for the jekzha-man, of course, was known and required no scrutiny from the guards-was somewhat daunting, but once back in the jekzha and trundling comfortably down the steep Street of the Armorers towards the Caravan Market, she quickly recovered her vivacity, gazing about her with delight. At the entrance to the paved market they had to stop while a string of pack-oxen plodded by, their bales covered in rain-soaked sacking. An apothecary's 'prentice, standing at the door of his master's shop, gazed at Maia admiringly.
"Where are you off to, sweetheart?"
Maia, leaning round the side of the jekzha, let her cloak fall open for his benefit and gave him a warm smile.
"To see a friend from Urtah."
"Urtah?" said he, tossing his head. "You'd much better come in here. I'll teach you all about pestles and mortars, if you like."
"My friend's a champion javelin-thrower!" retorted Maia as the jekzha moved on: at which the young fellow roared with laughter and stood watching her out of sight.
They found the house without difficulty and Maia paid the man while the porter's boy went up to Eud-Ecachlon's rooms. The Urtan came down at once: his face, when he
saw Maia standing at the foot of the stairs, fell all too plainly.
"Maia?" he said, stopping short on the lowest step. "But I thought-Occula-"
Maia had already anticipated this. At least he remembered her name, which was better than she had expected. Taking three quick steps forward, she put a hand on his arm, looking up at him and smiling as she unfastened her cloak.
"Occula's so sorry, my lord. Sometimes things happen when girls aren't quite expecting them-you know? But I'll tell you something else if you like." She looked round, then stood on tiptoe and whisperedr "I wouldn't let anyone else come instead; only me. At the party-that night- when I first saw you, I felt-oh, can't we go somewhere where I can say what I really mean? It's not just by accident I'm here, tell you that." And with this she half-closed her eyes and took another step upward, so that she was standing beside him. Eud-Ecachlon, without a word, led her up the staircase.
Thereafter there was not much that he or any other normal man could have done to resist her, for Maia entered upon their business with a fervent, happy confidence that carried all before it.
The occasion proved more successful than she had dared to hope. She surprised even herself. Indeed, it was during this same afternoon that Maia came to realize that she had the luck to possess not only exceptional beauty but also an exceptional erotic aptitude. Occula, she knew, despised Eud-Ecachlon and had formed a poor opinion of his virility. Very well: it took all sorts to make a world; if Occula couldn't get the bull through the gate, she'd just have to do it for her, wouldn't she? Sharp-set after her recent, frustrating days, she was eager for pleasure and by no means disposed to be critical. Her forthright ardor was something for which Eud-Ecachlon, rather impassive and a little slow off the mark by nature, was quite unprepared. Despite being the heir of Urtah, he was not really very self-confident, and in his dealings with girls had become all-too-used to tepid acquiescence. This tended to make him nervous and often barely successful-as with Occula; but no one could have felt nervous of a happy-go-lucky, frisking child like Maia. With a kind of rapturous astonishment, Eud-Ecachlon suddenly found himself giving as
good as he got. The afternoon took on an unreal, extravagant quality, with after-play imperceptibly turning into fore-play and pleasure becoming uncoordinated, to everyone's enjoyment and no one's frustration. Kembri had been accurate in judging Maia's artless charm capable of exercising a strong appeal. The essence, of course, lay in her being as yet a stranger to dissimulation.
At length, roused out of sleepy contentment by the gongs of the clock towers sounding for the sixth hour after noon, she sat up in panic.